


What's left

by ariadne83



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Angst, Episode Related, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-13
Updated: 2009-11-13
Packaged: 2017-10-02 15:00:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7660
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariadne83/pseuds/ariadne83
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rodney has a confession to make</p>
            </blockquote>





	What's left

**Author's Note:**

> Episode tag for Sunday (canon-compliant)

That Friday night, movie night, Rodney bustled in half an hour early - an occurrence so rare John wasn't even dressed yet. He stood there in his old, holey sweats, raised his eyebrows and stared at him, on the point of commenting when Rodney blurted out, "I slept with Daniel Jackson." He stood there, bouncing on his heels, practically vibrating with… something. Waiting for a response. John obliged by saying the first thing that came to mind.

"Gee, Rodney, thanks for sharing."

"I know, I know," he babbled, hurling himself into a chair. "I just had to tell someone."

And there they were with no Carson for Rodney to vent to. "Hold that thought." John grabbed a pair of pants and retreated to the bathroom, changing as fast as humanly possible. When he was done he slipped out, crossed the room to his stash and popped the top off two beers. He handed one to Rodney, who stared at it dumbly, and took a long pull on his before flopping onto the bed. "Y'know, I didn't even know you swung that way."

"I don't," Rodney said, evidently horrified. "At least, I didn't. I don't even know how it happened, we just-"

John winced. "Spare me the details, OK?"

Rodney's mouth snapped shut but his eyes bugged out, the effort not to say anything showing in the veins popping up along his neck. John sighed and waved a hand at him, taking another long pull on his beer.

"I'm not gay." Rodney blurted out. "I don't… I never…" He trailed off and glanced down at the beer again in puzzlement, as if he'd just realised he was holding it.

"And yet apparently you had sex with a guy."

"Just one. Just once." Rodney protested. "Oh god, maybe I am gay. What if I've been chasing after the wrong gender my whole life?"

"Rodney." John's voice came out sharper than he intended but it stopped Rodney in his tracks, so score one on Sheppard's account. "You sure you wanna talk about this now? There's gonna be people showing up in, like, ten minutes." He made a show of checking his watch.

Rodney drew himself up straight, face gone rigid with a look John recognised as the one reserved for coffee thieves and pudding hoarders. "I'm sorry if I made you uncomfortable," he snapped. "I just thought that you of all people would understand. I mean you're…" He flapped a hand between them and suddenly John got it. Rodney wasn't the most observant of people, so if even he'd noticed… John scrubbed a hand over his face, trying to stay calm.

"Rodney, why do you think I'm gay?"

"Ronon said you asked him if he was seeing anyone. A guy someone. And I… I…"

"You thought I was trying to cruise Ronon?"

"Weren't you?"

"No! We were just talking and it came up. Anyway, weren't we supposed to be talking about you?"

"Fine, fine; I'm not gay, you're not gay and Ronon's definitely not gay."

John tilted his head and tried to keep a straight face. "Did you make a pass at him?" He couldn't help cracking a smile.

"I… You…" Rodney sputtered. "That's beside the point!"

"Hey, I'm just saying, if you did that counts as more than a one-time thing."

"And? So? Therefore?" Rodney said impatiently

"You might be a little more gay than you thought." Again, John's voice was sharper than he intended, but come on. There were worse things in life than being quasi-gay.

Rodney slouched in his seat. "I can't stop thinking about it; I can't sleep. I'm a horrible, horrible person. We buried my best friend and then I just went out and fucked the first person that offered. How can I…?" Rodney's voice broke. "He wouldn't be dead if it weren't for me, if I'd just..."

Right around that point was when John lost his last thread of temper. "Jesus Christ, Rodney, cut yourself some slack. When something like this happens," - Rodney flinched, but John barrelled on, taking a leaf out of Rodney's book of interpersonal skills - "there's no 'normal' in how it hits you, how you react. What other people think doesn't mean shit. You deal with it however you can; no-one has the right to fault you for that. But this other stuff that you're trying to deal with? I'm not going to say it doesn't matter, but it's just a distraction. When you stop thinking about what it means that you took it up the ass, or whatever you did, Carson will still be dead. Everyone else whose lives he saved in the process won't be. He made a choice and there was nothing any of us could do about it; this is the way he wanted it. And moping around, or feeling bad about moving on sure as hell isn't going to bring him back but I bet it'd piss him off."

Rodney stared at him, grey-faced, and as John watched Rodney's beer slipped through his fingers and acquainted itself intimately with gravity. Abruptly, John felt like an asshole.

"Look, Rodney," he said quietly. "Can we just forget about this whole," - John gestured in front of himself with his bottle, sloshing beer onto the floor next to the spot where Rodney's bottle had taken up residence - "thing, for a while? It's not doing you any favours, dwelling on it." John set down his bottle and picked up Rodney's before shifting over to the dresser to find something to clean up the mess. When he came back Rodney was still sitting there, frozen. He blinked out of his fugue when John laid a hand on his shoulder.

"I should go," he stammered, pushing himself up and out of his seat.

"Don't." John kept his grip on Rodney's shoulder, daring him to shrug him off. "Trust me, you don't need to be stuck in your head right now." He squeezed gently and then dropped his hand. "Just... stay a while. Watch a movie with us. Teyla's hardly seen you for weeks."

Rodney sagged. "I... It feels wrong, that things can be so normal when..."

"Yeah, I know."


End file.
